The targeted ambush and assassinations of law enforcement officers across the nation is a clear and present danger to the safety and security of the United States. According to the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial, police officer deaths from guns is up 72% from July 2015.

From law enforcement to media accounts, the suspects in many of these shootings have clearly indicated they are targeting police officers. The US Department of Justice Civil Rights Division works to advance three basic principles, according to the official web site. The principles are:

1. Expanding opportunity for all people: the opportunity to live where one chooses, the opportunity to learn, the opportunity to earn, and the opportunity to worship freely in one’s community.  
2. Ensuring that the fundamental infrastructure of democracy is in place: by protecting the right to vote and access to justice, by ensuring that communities have effective and democratically accountable policing, and by protecting those who protect us.         
3. Protecting the most vulnerable among us: by ensuring they can live free from fear of exploitation, discrimination, and violence.

The function and role of policing is clearly recognized in the second and third principle. The police must be protected from these targeted acts of assassination and violence, so that communities can live free from fear of...violence.

The war on police must be addressed by the Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation to determine if there is a concerted effort to deprive police officers of their civil rights through targeted killings, and the call for targeted killings.